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Monday, March 7, 2016

Preemptive Hair System - @FlashMobWrites

I wrote a weird little tale for Flash Mob this week. This started as a very different story called "Optional Teeth."

Preemptive Hair System

OMG LOL What is that?

A wig. It’s in the room.

ROFL. I can’t stop laughing.

Donna turned the mannequin head on the pedestal to get a
better iPhone photo of the shaggy orange hairpiece. She’d neatly yelped upon
seeing it in Frank’s room when she was discretely looking for more toilet paper
after coming up short in the hall bathroom. The silhouette of the head in the
dark room looked incredibly realistic.

The screen on her phone didn’t really capture how similar
the wig was to real hair. It was uncanny. Donna had been dating him for nearly
two months and she never guessed that he wore a hairpiece, much less a full
wig. Now that she knew the truth, she was ashamed to admit her first instinct
was to send a photo of the thing to Lisa. Her heart sank in knowing that she’d
likely need to break up with him now. She couldn’t be with someone that wore a
wig. Bald maybe. But full on toupee of worse, no thanks.

“What are you doing?”

She froze. Frank had found her.

“I,” she started then abandoned attempting to explain this
away. Donna turned back to the door to see Frank standing with his hands on his
hips, blocking most of her way out. Even now, his hair didn’t look much like a
wig.

“Is this funny?” he asked, taking a step towards her.

“No. Listen Frank. . . ”

“That’s my own hair,” he smiled. It was the same grin he had
when he gave her a tour of his action figure shelf.

He stepped to an armoire and swung the double doors open. “I
have four more like it.” She was presented with a quartet of additional wigs on
identical mannequin heads. “I harvest it every two years.”

Donna found enough bandwidth in her psyche to allow her
thumbs to start texting Lisa again.

FRANK IS BANANAS.

“But, you don’t look like you need a wig,” she said. “We’ve.
. . made love and I pulled-“

“My hair? Yes, I remember. It kind of hurt.”

“But you have one of these on?”

“Not yet. I make these from my existing hair. For when I
need it later.“

“What?”

“Think of it as a hair bank. When you get to be sixty,
wouldn’t you rather have a wig of your own hair rather than that of a stranger
or animal?”

“I suppose.”

“You would. Trust me.”

“Is there any other part of you that’s . . . nontraditional”

He motioned for her come back out with him. “I pulled my
permanent teeth and preemptively made them into dentures.” Frank gave her a
toothy grin and Donna totally forgot about the needed toilet paper. Like his
hair, Frank’s teeth were perfect. A little too perfect. He was likely joking.
She’d be able to check him out later though. Once he was asleep she’d reach
into his maw and tug at his teeth to see if she had anything else to text to
Lisa tonight.